Speaker 1: Hello, I'm Richard McClain smith, and you're listening to Unexplained. Sadly,
Speaker 1: due to my being completely flawed by the flu this week,
Speaker 1: there's no new episode, so huge apologies for that. The
Speaker 1: show will resume as per usual next week. In place
Speaker 1: of the scheduled episode, I'm going to replay one of
Speaker 1: my favorites from season four, which I think is one
Speaker 1: of the stories that has touched me the most. In
Speaker 1: February nineteen seventy eight, five young men from the Ubasutter
Speaker 1: area in northern California, took a short trip to watch
Speaker 1: their favorite basketball team. But the men never returned home.
Speaker 1: It's a tragic and beguiling mystery that to this day
Speaker 1: remains unexplained. This is season four, episode seven, called to
Speaker 1: the Forest. Look closely into the daily goings on of
Speaker 1: any town or city, and soon enough you'll come across
Speaker 1: something a little unsavory or unsettling. A strange paradox when
Speaker 1: you consider that such places are often held up as
Speaker 1: examples of our superior sense of civility. We need not
Speaker 1: be so hard on ourselves, however, considering the number of
Speaker 1: different people and ideas all crammed in together in these places,
Speaker 1: It's a wonder they function at all. That said, when
Speaker 1: things happen there that aren't to our liking, we have
Speaker 1: only ourselves to blame, and it is only through ourselves
Speaker 1: alone that we can rectify such unwonted situations. The same
Speaker 1: cannot be said for the town of Castle Rock, the
Speaker 1: principal location and title of the recent Hulu TV series
Speaker 1: based on the works of Stephen King. Without wanting to
Speaker 1: give anything away, the show essentially details the life of
Speaker 1: a seemingly quaint and quiet town in which darkness, in
Speaker 1: one form or another appears especially drawn to it. I
Speaker 1: was reminded of this show when researching this week's story.
Speaker 1: Though I would never suggest an entire town, or in
Speaker 1: this case, a whole region, was preternaturally susceptible to unfortunate things.
Speaker 1: If I were to believe that such things were possible, however,
Speaker 1: this place would certainly provide a compelling case study. The
Speaker 1: Uber Sutter area, of which Yuba City is the principal city,
Speaker 1: begins ten miles to the north of Sacramento and stretches
Speaker 1: northwestwards toward the foothills of the Sierra Nevada Mountain Range.
Speaker 1: In the early eighteenth century, Much of the land, which
Speaker 1: would eventually encompass most of Yuba County, including the Yuba
Speaker 1: City area, was sold to a highly controversial individual named
Speaker 1: John Sutter around one hundred and fifty years later, the
Speaker 1: county's name would become synonymous with one of the United
Speaker 1: states most enduring and tragic mysteries. You're listening to Unexplained
Speaker 1: and I'm Richard McLean Smith. In the early nineteenth century,
Speaker 1: Johann Sutter had been wanted for fraud in his home
Speaker 1: country of Switzerland before deciding to change his name to
Speaker 1: John and take his chances in the fledgling United States.
Speaker 1: Leaving behind a wife and five children, He arrived in
Speaker 1: New York in eighteen thirty four and spent the next
Speaker 1: five years exhaustively touring the continent to get the measure
Speaker 1: of it. After managing to ingratiate himself with a number
Speaker 1: of prominent Euro American dignitaries, he eventually settled in what
Speaker 1: was then Alta, California in the summer of eighteen thirty nine.
Speaker 1: At the time, Alta California was a relatively undeveloped province
Speaker 1: of Mexico. Having so far managed to resist the clutches
Speaker 1: of the ever expanding United States. Realizing the area's potential,
Speaker 1: Sutter succeeded in convincing the local governor to sell him
Speaker 1: almost fifty thousand acres of land along the Sacramento River.
Speaker 1: The following year, he established a trading colony there, which
Speaker 1: he named New Helvetia. Rarely is such a story of
Speaker 1: land purchase complete without some form of Native American displacement
Speaker 1: or indeed slaughter, and Sutter's was no different. Local tribes
Speaker 1: that were unwilling to recognize these self appointed owners of
Speaker 1: the lands that they lived on were dispensed with swiftly,
Speaker 1: being either forcibly moved or exterminated entirely. Any tribes adopted
Speaker 1: to co operate with the Euro American or Mexican settlers
Speaker 1: would invariably be put to work as little more than slaves.
Speaker 1: The exact number of Native Americans that were killed in
Speaker 1: the establishing of New Helvetia is unknown. It is thought, however,
Speaker 1: that Sutter kept as many as six to eight hundred
Speaker 1: of them as slaves, often locking them up in squalid
Speaker 1: pens and placing their food in troughs, forcing them to
Speaker 1: eat like farm animals. It is also speculated that he
Speaker 1: raped Native American girls as young as twelve years old.
Speaker 1: In eighteen forty eight, gold was discovered on Sutter's land. However,
Speaker 1: any hope he had of profiting from it was swiftly
Speaker 1: dashed when his efforts to keep its secret failed miserably.
Speaker 1: Within months, Sutter's land was overrun with swaves of prospectors
Speaker 1: feverishly clawing at the earth in search of the shiny metal.
Speaker 1: Such was the speed with which the gold rush unfolded,
Speaker 1: there as little that Sutter could do to stop them.
Speaker 1: Having bought more land in a bid to claim ownership
Speaker 1: of any gold found on it, Sutter soon found himself
Speaker 1: in major debt. With no other options, he was forced
Speaker 1: to sell off his land, transferring any deeds he had
Speaker 1: left into the name of his son. His land owning
Speaker 1: ambitions were finished. A comic come upance. Perhaps if you
Speaker 1: believe in such things, perhaps two. If you believe in
Speaker 1: such things, you might say the series of events that
Speaker 1: would befall the region in subsequent years were inevitable given
Speaker 1: what many would consider to be such rotten beginnings. Part
Speaker 1: of the land that Sutter was forced to sell was
Speaker 1: located just forty miles north of New Helvetia and centered
Speaker 1: around the confluence of the Uber and Feather Rivers. The
Speaker 1: land was sold in eighteen forty nine to a small
Speaker 1: consortium of men headed by Samuel Brannan, who quickly established
Speaker 1: Uber City in the middle of it. Almost immediately, the
Speaker 1: fledgling city was overshadowed by Marysville, the town on the
Speaker 1: opposite bank of the Feather River, which newcomers found much
Speaker 1: easier to access, But soon it began to prosper, and
Speaker 1: over the next one hundred years the city grew steadily
Speaker 1: from a population of three hundred to seven and a
Speaker 1: half thousand. Then, in December nineteen fifty five, a series
Speaker 1: of devastating storms battered northern California. After days of relentless rain,
Speaker 1: at just after midnight on December twenty fourth, a levee
Speaker 1: broke on the west bank of the Feather River, sending
Speaker 1: a wall of water twenty one feet high, cascading into
Speaker 1: the county and flooding ninety percent of Yuba City. Seventy
Speaker 1: four people were killed. Five years later, a Bowing fifty
Speaker 1: two bomber plane carrying two three point eight megaton thermonuclear
Speaker 1: bombs flying into the vicinity of Uber County experienced a
Speaker 1: sudden and inexplicable loss of pressure in the fuselage. After
Speaker 1: ordering the rest of the crew to bail out, the
Speaker 1: heroic pilot managed to stay in the cockpit just long
Speaker 1: enough to steer the plane away from Uber City before
Speaker 1: bailing out himself. At only four thousand feet the plaine
Speaker 1: would eventually crash into a barley field just eleven miles
Speaker 1: to the west of the city. Miraculously, no radioactive material
Speaker 1: was released as a result. In late spring nineteen seventy one,
Speaker 1: a Uber County peach farmer noticed a large, freshly dug
Speaker 1: hole on his land that had no apparent purpose. When
Speaker 1: he found it filled in the next day, he became
Speaker 1: suspicious and called the police to investigate it. Digging away
Speaker 1: the fresh dirt, they found a man's body underneath, riddled
Speaker 1: with stab wounds. The man was just one of at
Speaker 1: least twenty five migrant farm workers from around the Yuba
Speaker 1: County area that serial killer and Yuber City resident Juan
Speaker 1: Corona was eventually convicted of murdering. Corona had been previously
Speaker 1: diagnosed with schizophrenia, which some believe was triggered by the
Speaker 1: trauma he suffered. As a witness to the worst effects
Speaker 1: of the nineteen fifty five flood. Another five years later,
Speaker 1: a school bus carrying the Yuba City High School choir
Speaker 1: broke through a guard rail just outside the city of Martinez,
Speaker 1: plunging thirty feet to the ground. Twenty eight teenagers from
Speaker 1: the city and their chaperone were killed instantly in what
Speaker 1: was the worst school bus accident ever recorded in the
Speaker 1: United States at the time. And yet, incredibly, despite this
Speaker 1: litany of tragedy, the one for which the area would
Speaker 1: become most well known had yet to pass. The story,
Speaker 1: most often referred to as the Uber County five, is
Speaker 1: a bizarre and heartbreaking mystery that remains to this day unexplained. Ma'am,
Speaker 1: have you seen my Gaiters T shirt? Cried Gary from
Speaker 1: the laundry room. I need it for the game tomorrow.
Speaker 1: Gary's mum Ida appeared a moment later, holding the beige
Speaker 1: T shirt, complete with its gateway Gaiter's logo emblazoned across it.
Speaker 1: All washed and ready to go, thanks, said Gary, taking
Speaker 1: it before running to place it with the rest of
Speaker 1: his kit that he'd laid out in preparation for the
Speaker 1: next day. Just then, the sound of a car horn
Speaker 1: could be heard coming from the turquoise Mercury Montego that
Speaker 1: had just pulled up outside the front of the house.
Speaker 1: They're here, said Gary excitedly as he grabbed his jacket
Speaker 1: and headed toward the door. Remember I've got a big
Speaker 1: game tomorrow. Don't let me sleep in, he said. Yes,
Speaker 1: I know, said Ida, before kissing her son good bye
Speaker 1: and seeing him out the door. It was February twenty fourth,
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy eight, in the small district of Olivehurst, just
Speaker 1: to the south of Eubers. Far off in the distance,
Speaker 1: the northern tip of the Sierra Nevada Mountains could be seen,
Speaker 1: its pine covered ranges still capped with snow. Down in
Speaker 1: the valley, however, it was barely jacket weather, as a
Speaker 1: pale sun was slowly beginning its final descent toward the horizon.
Speaker 1: Waiting for Gary outside in the montago was thirty year
Speaker 1: old driver and owner of the vehicle, Jack Madruga, accompanied
Speaker 1: by thirty two year old Ted Weir and the twenty
Speaker 1: four year old Jack Hewitt. The others shouted for Gary
Speaker 1: to hurry up as he raced to the car and
Speaker 1: jumped into the front seat. Moments later, they pulled away
Speaker 1: as Ida waved them off from her front door. A
Speaker 1: few minutes later, they were parking up outside a small
Speaker 1: house on Talleda Street in Yuba City to collect the
Speaker 1: fifth and final member of the group, twenty nine year
Speaker 1: old Bill Sterling. With Bill finally settled in the back seat,
Speaker 1: they were on their way once more. The five men
Speaker 1: were friends from around the Yuba County area who had
Speaker 1: met at the Gateways Project, a local organization that helped
Speaker 1: adults with intellectual disabilities to better navigate their lives. Driver
Speaker 1: Jack Madruga was perhaps the least affected by his disability.
Speaker 1: Although he had never been diagnosed with anything specific, his
Speaker 1: thought processes were considered to be slower than average. An
Speaker 1: Army veteran, Jack had served two years in Vietnam as
Speaker 1: a truck driver and had recently started a job as
Speaker 1: a dishwasher at a local dried fruit company. Ted and
Speaker 1: Bill were perhaps the closest in the group, having known
Speaker 1: each other for almost eight years. Had been doing especially
Speaker 1: well recently, gaining employment through the Gateway Project repairing cables
Speaker 1: for a local gas and electricity company. Just like the others,
Speaker 1: Ted was not thought capable of fending for himself, so
Speaker 1: lived at home with his parents. In his case, this
Speaker 1: was due to what some considered to be a basic
Speaker 1: lack of common sense. One time, when Ted's parents' house
Speaker 1: caught fire, Ted had been more concerned about getting a
Speaker 1: good night's sleep than the flames that had begun raging
Speaker 1: above his bed. His brother had to forcibly pull him
Speaker 1: out of the house to save him. When Ted tried
Speaker 1: to make friends with strangers, he could never understand why
Speaker 1: they seemed so intimidated by him, or why they wouldn't
Speaker 1: simply wave back when he waved at them. Bill Sterling
Speaker 1: had also done well to gain employment working as a
Speaker 1: dishwasher at the nearby Beal Air Force. Bill enjoyed the position,
Speaker 1: especially the sense of independence it had given him. However,
Speaker 1: he was instructed by his parents to quit the job
Speaker 1: not long after taking it, after they discovered that some
Speaker 1: of the air men there had been plying him with
Speaker 1: alcohol and stealing his wages. Bill had spent much of
Speaker 1: his youth in Napa State Psychiatric Hospital, being generally misdiagnosed
Speaker 1: and misunderstood. Of all of them, twenty four year old Jack,
Speaker 1: who could not read, write, or use a telephone, was
Speaker 1: generally thought to be the most severely affected by his disabilities.
Speaker 1: Having met Ted back when he was sixteen, Jack, who
Speaker 1: was also deeply shy, had come to rely heavily on him,
Speaker 1: and the pair had become firm friends as a result.
Speaker 1: And then there was Garry. Unlike the other four who
Speaker 1: often went everywhere together and had known each other for
Speaker 1: an extended period of time, twenty five year old Gary
Speaker 1: Matthias was a fairly new addition to the group. Gary
Speaker 1: was also an Army veteran stationed for a few years
Speaker 1: in Germany. After suffering a psychiatric episode brought on by
Speaker 1: hallucinogenic drug use, Gary was discharged and sent home. For
Speaker 1: the past two years, however, Gary had been well and
Speaker 1: successfully holding down a job at his stepfather, Robert Clock's
Speaker 1: gardening business. Gary had been introduced to the Gateway Project
Speaker 1: as a way of finding new friends, and had bonded
Speaker 1: with the others over their mutual love of basketball. All
Speaker 1: of them played for the Gateway Gaiters, the project's basketball team,
Speaker 1: and were looking forward to a big tournament they were
Speaker 1: due to play in the following morning, which promised an
Speaker 1: all expenses paid trip to Los Angeles for the winning
Speaker 1: team that night. However, their excitement was for a different game.
Speaker 1: The friends were heading up to Chico, an hour's drive
Speaker 1: to the north, to watch their favorite team, University California Davis,
Speaker 1: take on Chico State. Despite their disabilities, such a trip
Speaker 1: wasn't unusual, since the boys regularly traveled together to watch
Speaker 1: them play at their home stadium in Davis or anywhere
Speaker 1: else that wasn't too far to drive before returning straight home.
Speaker 1: That night shouldn't have been any different. After picking up Bill,
Speaker 1: the men made a quick stop at Mico's service station
Speaker 1: on Caloosa Avenue. The others stayed in the car as
Speaker 1: Bill ran inside to pick up his fifteen dollar allowance
Speaker 1: from his parents, who ran the place. Bill's mother, Juanita,
Speaker 1: who was concerned about the men making the trip the
Speaker 1: night before their tournament, tried again to dissuade her son
Speaker 1: from going. As Bill explained, however, tonight was the last
Speaker 1: chance they'd get to watch their team this season, and
Speaker 1: there was no way they were going to pass that up.
Speaker 1: Realizing it was a lost cause, Juanita warned Bill not
Speaker 1: to be back too late before sending him on his way.
Speaker 1: Later that night, the men watched with delight as UC
Speaker 1: Davis picked up their seventeenth win of the season, beating
Speaker 1: Chico ninety eight to eighty six. Shortly after ten pm,
Speaker 1: the men left the Chico University Stadium and piled back
Speaker 1: into Jack's Montago. Soon after leaving the parking lot, one
Speaker 1: of the men suggested they make a quick stop to
Speaker 1: get some supplies for the return journey. Pulling up outside
Speaker 1: a convenience store moments later, they were disappointed to find
Speaker 1: the shop clerk closing the place up. After taking pity
Speaker 1: on them, however, she agreed to stay open just long
Speaker 1: enough for them to get what they needed. A short
Speaker 1: time later, the men were back in the car, loaded
Speaker 1: with some fruit pies and chocolate bath as Jack slowly
Speaker 1: eased onto the road before heading off into the night.
Speaker 1: Juanita Sterling hadn't taken her eyes off the clock since midnight.
Speaker 1: All things going to plan, her son should have been
Speaker 1: home by then by two a m. She couldn't hold
Speaker 1: out any longer. It wasn't the first time that Bill
Speaker 1: hadn't come home on time, or had even gone missing completely.
Speaker 1: Often he would go and stay with friends and just
Speaker 1: simply forget to call home. Each previous occasion, he had
Speaker 1: never been more than a quick phone call away. Trying
Speaker 1: not to panic, Juanita picked up the phone and dialed
Speaker 1: for Melbourgh, Jack Madrugu's mother with whom he lived in
Speaker 1: nearby Linda, but Jack was also yet to come home.
Speaker 1: It was a few hours later that Ted's mother, Imogun Weir,
Speaker 1: who had slept through the earlier phone calls, woke up
Speaker 1: to find her son's bed empty, having not been slept
Speaker 1: in the night before. Calling Juanita immediately, she was shocked
Speaker 1: to find that both Bill and Jack were also still missing.
Speaker 1: Calling Jack Hewitt's mother soon after, Imogun got the same response.
Speaker 1: Their last hope was that the boys had all gone
Speaker 1: to Garry Matthias's family home. Since the Weirs lived just
Speaker 1: down the street from them, Imagon's daughter in law volunteered
Speaker 1: to go and check if they were there. The look
Speaker 1: on her face when she returned was all Imogen needed
Speaker 1: to know. The men were due to meet the rest
Speaker 1: of their Gateway Gaiters team later that morning outside a
Speaker 1: store in Marysville. Knowing the five wouldn't have missed their
Speaker 1: tournament for the world, a few of the family members
Speaker 1: traveled to the store in hope that their sons and
Speaker 1: brothers might yet be there, but the men never appeared.
Speaker 1: By eight p m. Having still heard nothing from them,
Speaker 1: Melbourne Madruga informed the Uber County Sheriff's office that her
Speaker 1: son and his four best friends were missing. That weekend,
Speaker 1: the various families spent the days in a complete haze,
Speaker 1: anxiously looking out for any mention of a car crash
Speaker 1: or sighting of the missing men, but nothing came. On Monday,
Speaker 1: having heard nothing from the police, Juanita took it on
Speaker 1: herself to drive to Chico, where she handed out pictures
Speaker 1: of the five friends to the various ticket sellers and
Speaker 1: security officers at the University basketball stadium. None, however, recognized
Speaker 1: the faces that had been sat in the venue for
Speaker 1: over two hours only a few nights before. In the meantime,
Speaker 1: the Sheriff's office had released a statement to the local
Speaker 1: press giving a detailed description of the missing men and
Speaker 1: the vehicle they were traveling, in, urging anyone to come
Speaker 1: forward who might have important information as to their whereabouts.
Speaker 1: Having been given a brief description of the personalities he
Speaker 1: was looking for and taking into account their intellectual disabilities,
Speaker 1: Yuba County under Sheriff Jack Beecham was stumped as to
Speaker 1: what might have happened to them. Certainly, no crashes with
Speaker 1: that type of vehicle had been reported, and judging by
Speaker 1: how the parents described it, there was no reason to
Speaker 1: suggest that the men had struck out on an impromptu
Speaker 1: road trip. The following day, Beecham received an unexpected call
Speaker 1: from Plumus National Forest ranger Willard Burris. Buris had been
Speaker 1: making his way along a forest road when he came
Speaker 1: across an abandoned car. He hadn't thought anything about it
Speaker 1: at the time, but having seen a news report about
Speaker 1: the missing men later that day, he thought to call
Speaker 1: it in. Beecham was confused, however, Plumus Forest covered the
Speaker 1: northern tip of the Sierra Nevada Mountains and was located
Speaker 1: about seventy miles east of Chico, in the complete opposite
Speaker 1: direction to where the men were supposed to have been heading. Moreover,
Speaker 1: the point at which Burris claimed to have seen the
Speaker 1: car was four thousand feet high into them, but Burris
Speaker 1: was adamant the vehicle he had seen was a turquoise
Speaker 1: mercury Montego. The following day, Wednesday, March first, under Sheriff,
Speaker 1: Beecham with a handful of Deputies made his way to
Speaker 1: the spot detailed by forest ranger Burris. An hour later,
Speaker 1: the officers found themselves leaving the mild flats of the
Speaker 1: Euber Shutter area and heading up into the Sierra Nevada
Speaker 1: Mountains toward the snow covered pines of Plumus National Forest.
Speaker 1: With the temperature steadily dropping the higher they climbed, they
Speaker 1: were soon approaching the snow line at an altitude of
Speaker 1: roughly four thousand feet. The road was known locally as
Speaker 1: the Oraville to Quincy Road, running from the foothill town
Speaker 1: of Oroville at the western edge of the mountains, snaking
Speaker 1: east via the town of Quincy all the way through
Speaker 1: to the other side. During the summer months, the roads
Speaker 1: would be jammed with day trippers and holiday makers heading
Speaker 1: out to one of the many cabins that dotted the
Speaker 1: surrounding area, with Bucks Lake, located in the middle of
Speaker 1: the forest about fifty miles from Oraville, being the biggest draw.
Speaker 1: During the winter months, however, by the time you had
Speaker 1: reached the snow line, the road would quickly become impassable
Speaker 1: to all but the most hardy of vehicles. It was
Speaker 1: at this point with the unpaved forest road becoming ever
Speaker 1: narrower and more rugged. That Beecham spotted the car that
Speaker 1: Willard Burris had come across. Although by now it was
Speaker 1: carrying a light dusting of snow, Beecham could see clearly
Speaker 1: that it was indeed a turquoise nineteen sixty nine Mercury Montego.
Speaker 1: Beecham wrapped his jacket a little tighter about himself as
Speaker 1: he made his way through the slush towards the vehicle.
Speaker 1: Brushing away the snow from the window, he looked inside.
Speaker 1: Empty food wrappers were strewn about on the back seat,
Speaker 1: along with a couple of basketball programs, but the vehicle
Speaker 1: was otherwise empty. Trying the door, he was surprised to
Speaker 1: find it unlocked, but the keys were gone. Pulling a
Speaker 1: panel from under the steering wheel, Beecham fiddled with the
Speaker 1: wires until the car's engine roared into life. The under
Speaker 1: sheriff watched as the needle on the dashboard moved up
Speaker 1: to reveal at least a quarter tank of gas left
Speaker 1: in it. Stepping out of the car, Beecham took in
Speaker 1: the scene around him, staring off into the trees that
Speaker 1: backed away from the road. The ground covered in fresh
Speaker 1: snow from the night before, All was completely silent, and
Speaker 1: there was no sign of track marks anywhere leading down
Speaker 1: or off the road. Looking at the front wheels, he
Speaker 1: could see that they were a little stuck in the snow,
Speaker 1: but it was nothing that a quick push couldn't have dislodged.
Speaker 1: None of it seemed to make sense. Why on earth
Speaker 1: would the five friends have driven up into the mountains
Speaker 1: and then abandoned the car like this with absolutely no
Speaker 1: reason to unless, of course, it hadn't been them at
Speaker 1: all that had brought it there in the first place.
Speaker 1: Could it be? Beecham thought that it had been stolen
Speaker 1: and merely dumped there Where that might put the five
Speaker 1: missing men would be anyone's guess at this point. After
Speaker 1: calling it in, Beecham was promptly appointed to lead the
Speaker 1: search for the missing men. Forty personnel from Euba, Plumus
Speaker 1: and Butte County, along with snowmobiles and a highway patrol helicopter,
Speaker 1: were drafted in. For the rest of the day, they
Speaker 1: searched every inch of the surrounding forest within a five
Speaker 1: mile radius of the abandoned car for any sign of
Speaker 1: the two Jacks Hewitt and Madruga, Bill Stirling, ted Weir,
Speaker 1: and Gary Matthias, but no clue to their possible whereabouts
Speaker 1: was found. Beecham knew only too well that if the
Speaker 1: five men had driven into the mountains after all, only
Speaker 1: to abandon their vehicle, their survival would depend on finding
Speaker 1: shelter very quickly. Failure to do so, stumbling blindly in
Speaker 1: the dark in sub zero temperatures, dressed as they were
Speaker 1: for a mild evening, would most likely be fatal. Whats More,
Speaker 1: it had now been almost a week since they had disappeared,
Speaker 1: and no one in the immediate area had seen them,
Speaker 1: nor were they found in any of the nearby cabins
Speaker 1: that they might have sought as a place of refuge.
Speaker 1: Later that day, under Sheriff, Beecham had the unenviable task
Speaker 1: of informing the families of just what they had discovered.
Speaker 1: It was hard to gauge which scenario offered them the
Speaker 1: most hope, Whether the vehicle had been stolen and the
Speaker 1: men possibly assaulted and left stranded elsewhere, or whether they themselves,
Speaker 1: for reasons unknown, had abandoned the car high up in
Speaker 1: a mountain, late at night in minus zero temperatures. What
Speaker 1: Beecham did know, however, was that neither scenario looked good.
Speaker 1: After scouring everywhere within a five mile radius of the
Speaker 1: abandoned Mercury Montego, the Yuber County Sheriff's Office had found nothing.
Speaker 1: By the end of the day. However, they would have
Speaker 1: their first significant lead. It came from a man named
Speaker 1: Joseph Schones. Around five fifty p m. On Friday, February
Speaker 1: twenty fourth, the night the five men went missing. Shones
Speaker 1: was making his way into Plumus National Forest along to
Speaker 1: Aureville to Quincy Road. Fifty five year old Shons had
Speaker 1: been checking to see if the road would be accessible
Speaker 1: for a trip he planned to take that weekend when
Speaker 1: his Volkswagen bug got suddenly stuck in the snow. After
Speaker 1: trying unsuccessfully to push it out, Schones felt a painful
Speaker 1: tightening in his chest and immediately got back inside the
Speaker 1: vehicle to catch his breath. Unbeknownst to him at the time,
Speaker 1: he had suffered my heart attack. Being in such discomfort,
Speaker 1: he decided his best hope was to keep the engine
Speaker 1: running and try to stay warm until it passed, or
Speaker 1: until someone else came by who could help. Drifting in
Speaker 1: and out of consciousness as the pain in his chest intensified.
Speaker 1: It was about eleven thirty pm when Schons were startled
Speaker 1: awake by what he took to be two sets of
Speaker 1: headlights driving in from behind him, one belonging to a
Speaker 1: car and the other to a pickup truck by. Now
Speaker 1: unable to move, he could only watch in desperation as
Speaker 1: the lights passed him by and disappeared around the next bend.
Speaker 1: Thirty minutes later, after hearing what he thought were people
Speaker 1: whistling nearby, Schons gathered the strength to investigate. Stumbling along
Speaker 1: in the dark, he followed what he now took to
Speaker 1: be voices until he came across a car seemingly parked
Speaker 1: up by the road and a number of silhouetted figures
Speaker 1: moving about in front of its headlights. Schons later described
Speaker 1: one of them as possibly being a woman who was
Speaker 1: carrying a baby, with all the other figures being men.
Speaker 1: When Shons called out for help, the talking ceased immediately.
Speaker 1: Moments later, the headlights switched off plunged into complete darkness.
Speaker 1: Shones angrily called out again for help, but got no response.
Speaker 1: Suddenly feeling a little exposed, he swiftly turned around and
Speaker 1: headed back to his car. A short time later, he
Speaker 1: caught sight of what he assumed to be the beams
Speaker 1: of flashlights moving about in the forest around him. Calling
Speaker 1: out once more for help, he could only watch in
Speaker 1: desperation as one by one the beams of light were
Speaker 1: switched off in response. When shons Its engine eventually cut
Speaker 1: out at four am, he had little choice but to
Speaker 1: strike out for the nearest inhabited place that he could find.
Speaker 1: Remembering the vehicle he had seen from the night before,
Speaker 1: he decided first to check if it was still there.
Speaker 1: Sure enough, just where it had been the night before,
Speaker 1: he found What he could see then was a turquoise
Speaker 1: Mercury Montego, but no sign of its previous occupants anywhere.
Speaker 1: Despite suffering from a heart attack at the time, Joseph
Speaker 1: Schones eventually walked five miles to a nearby lodge house,
Speaker 1: from where he was later taken home by its manager.
Speaker 1: When explaining all this to the police later, although there
Speaker 1: was little doubt he had seen the abandoned car, Shons
Speaker 1: cautioned that since he wasn't entirely lucid at the time,
Speaker 1: not everything he s thund though what he had seen
Speaker 1: could be trusted either way, it was certainly something to
Speaker 1: go on. What's more, if a fifty five year old
Speaker 1: man suffering a heart attack was able to walk five
Speaker 1: miles down the road to safety, there was reason to
Speaker 1: hope that the five men from Uber County, Bill Stirling,
Speaker 1: Jack Madruger, Jack Hewitt, Ted Weeher and Gary Mathias could
Speaker 1: have done the same, provided they were indeed the men
Speaker 1: that Seans had seen. Under Sheriff Jack Beecham received another
Speaker 1: break shortly after, when a print dusting of the car
Speaker 1: revealed no other marks inside apart from those belonging to
Speaker 1: the missing men. Though it wasn't conclusive, it seemed to
Speaker 1: suggest at least that the car had not been stolen.
Speaker 1: By the end of that first day, nine inches of
Speaker 1: snow fell across the Plumous National Forest region, further complicating
Speaker 1: the sur Buoyed by Schonz's witness statement. However, the various
Speaker 1: local sheriff's departments expanded their search to as far as
Speaker 1: Buck's Lake, some twenty miles up the road from where
Speaker 1: the car was found, having discovered that Bill Sterling's family
Speaker 1: owned a cabin near the lake, there was a chance
Speaker 1: that the men might have tried to reach it, but
Speaker 1: again no footprints, clothing, or any other sign of them
Speaker 1: could be found. Back in the Uber City area, the
Speaker 1: families of the missing, crippled by worry, continued to wait
Speaker 1: helplessly for any sign of their sons and brothers. With
Speaker 1: the police continuing to draw a blank, some of the
Speaker 1: parents suggested contacting a psychic, in the expectation that even
Speaker 1: if they couldn't give them any clues, it might at
Speaker 1: least give them some hope. Doctor Gloria Daniel was a
Speaker 1: member of the Church of Zadi, an organization that claimed
Speaker 1: to teach its members how to become psychic. Although Daniel
Speaker 1: had not come officially recommended by the Uber County Police,
Speaker 1: it is said that she had successfully helped them with
Speaker 1: similar cases in the past. On the morning of Friday,
Speaker 1: March third, a handful of family members gathered together with
Speaker 1: doctor Daniel and watched expectantly as she ran her hands
Speaker 1: through a series of clothes belonging to the missing men.
Speaker 1: Then she sat back and closed her eyes. After a
Speaker 1: short pause, with the relatives in wrapt silence, Daniel began
Speaker 1: to speak. She could see people gathered together in a
Speaker 1: shack or a cabin in a wooded hilly area, somewhere
Speaker 1: near a body of water, she said. And something else,
Speaker 1: a small detail, a row of men tucked into what
Speaker 1: looked like green sacks made of canvas bags. Perhaps, she thought, so,
Speaker 1: they're still alive, asked one of the relatives. Hopefully. Doctor
Speaker 1: Daniel hesitated, then opened her eyes. I'm afraid that is
Speaker 1: all I can tell you, she said. By Saturday, March fourth,
Speaker 1: as the search entered its second week, the Butte and
Speaker 1: Plumers County sheriffs began to question the merits of continuing.
Speaker 1: With the recent storms showing no sign of letting up
Speaker 1: and the snow continuing to fall heavily, they decided to
Speaker 1: pull back their resources for under Sheriff Jack Beecham, who
Speaker 1: was supervising the entire search, and his superior Sheriff Grant. However,
Speaker 1: there was no question of calling it off anytime soon.
Speaker 1: Not only did the men's lives depend on it, but
Speaker 1: the entire reputation of the Up County Police Department was
Speaker 1: resting on it too. It was only the year before
Speaker 1: that then under Sheriff Lloyd Finley was arrested on charges
Speaker 1: of corruption, having been accused of stealing weapons, money, and
Speaker 1: other valuable articles from the county evidence room. The DA
Speaker 1: who had prosecuted him, believed the crimes were merely symptomatic
Speaker 1: of a corrupt undercurrent in local police practices which had
Speaker 1: been left unchallenged for too long. The case had been
Speaker 1: dragging on for almost a year by now, with it
Speaker 1: looking increasingly lightly that Finley was indeed guilty, finding the
Speaker 1: five missing men alive was the perfect opportunity to win
Speaker 1: back the community's trust for under Sheriff Beecham, who had
Speaker 1: been drafted in to replace Lloyd Finley, and Sheriff Grant
Speaker 1: facing re election later that year. The personal stakes could
Speaker 1: barely have been any higher. At the beginning of that
Speaker 1: second week, having put posters up of the missing men
Speaker 1: all across the Uber and Sutter area, and with reports
Speaker 1: of their disappearance a daily feature in the local news,
Speaker 1: the pair finally had another lead to follow up. Carol
Speaker 1: Waltz was the owner of a local store in Brownsville,
Speaker 1: another foothill town of the Sierra Nevada just south of Oraville.
Speaker 1: Waltz had been working on Saturday, February twenty fifth, the
Speaker 1: day after the men had last been seen, when two
Speaker 1: men matching the descriptions of Jack Hewitt and Gary Mathias
Speaker 1: came into her store. The pair was said to have
Speaker 1: bought a variety of snack foods before heading back outside
Speaker 1: to eat. A second witness also called that same day,
Speaker 1: claiming to have seen at least four of the men
Speaker 1: at the same store. The day after, two of them,
Speaker 1: who she took to be Bill Stirling and Ted Weer,
Speaker 1: were sitting in a red pickup truck, while two others,
Speaker 1: who she assumed to be Jack Madruger and Jack Hewitt,
Speaker 1: were seen at a telephone booth nearby. Having previously focused
Speaker 1: their search to no avail on the immediate vicinity of
Speaker 1: the abandoned car, Beecham now feared that he had missed
Speaker 1: a trick. In response to the possible sighting in Brownsville,
Speaker 1: who promptly split the investigation into four parts, with the
Speaker 1: mountain search still continuing. One unit was instructed to go
Speaker 1: back over all the evidence they had, tracing the men's
Speaker 1: movements up to the night that they disappeared. Another would
Speaker 1: focus on reinterviewing the family and friends, while the fourth
Speaker 1: focused its energies on trying to locate any more witnesses
Speaker 1: from Brownsville of immediate interest was the description of the
Speaker 1: pickup truck, now mentioned by two separate witnesses. A short
Speaker 1: time later, one friend of Gary Matthias's suggested he might
Speaker 1: have taken the men to visit friends in nearby Forbestown,
Speaker 1: but when the police contacted them, they claimed not to
Speaker 1: have heard from Gary for months. A fund set up
Speaker 1: by the desperate families for any vital information raised almost
Speaker 1: three and a half thousand dollars, but failed to yield
Speaker 1: any significant leads. On and on, the exhaustive search continued,
Speaker 1: entering a third and then a fourth week, but still
Speaker 1: the men could not be found. The police also failed
Speaker 1: to find any trace of the apparent pickup truck. On
Speaker 1: March twenty first, nineteen seventy eight, under Sheriff Beecham had
Speaker 1: no choice but to make the painful decision to call
Speaker 1: off the search. After hundreds of hours, having used almost
Speaker 1: one hundred personnel, sniffer dogs, helicopters and snowmobiles, the five
Speaker 1: friends who had supposedly left home merely to watch a
Speaker 1: game of basketball, had completely vanished off the face of
Speaker 1: the earth. With the search having wound down, one deputy
Speaker 1: was put in place of collecting any further information that
Speaker 1: might come to light. Having gone to Marysville High School
Speaker 1: with Ted Weer and his brothers, Deputy Lance Heirs had
Speaker 1: been affected by the men's disappearance, perhaps more than most,
Speaker 1: taking it as his personal mission to bring closure to
Speaker 1: the families, in whatever shape that may take. For the
Speaker 1: next few months, Heirs spiritedly followed up on each and
Speaker 1: every piece of information that came in, from apparent sightings
Speaker 1: of the men in Sacramento to as far as Ontario
Speaker 1: and Tampa in Florida. He chased them all to no avail.
Speaker 1: When one local psychic claimed that the men had been
Speaker 1: murdered in Oroville in a two story house numbered either
Speaker 1: four seven two three or four seven five three, Airs
Speaker 1: spent two days driving the streets for any sign of it,
Speaker 1: but no such house existed. On some nights, Deputy Heirs,
Speaker 1: dreaming that he had found them, would find himself walking
Speaker 1: toward them with open arms, only to wake up alone
Speaker 1: in the cold darkness of his bedroom, his arms still
Speaker 1: outstretched before him. By the end of May, even the
Speaker 1: families had begun to lose hope of ever finding out
Speaker 1: what had happened to their children, But high up on
Speaker 1: the mountain. The snow was steadily beginning to thaw, and
Speaker 1: soon it would be time to begin letting out up
Speaker 1: some of its secrets. On the afternoon of June fourth,
Speaker 1: three bikers went for a weekend ride through Plumus Forest.
Speaker 1: Heading along the Oureville to Quincy road, they decided to
Speaker 1: take a turn eastwards onto one of the narrower forest
Speaker 1: roads that headed higher up into the mountain. A short
Speaker 1: time later, the group pulled into the Daniel Zinc Campground,
Speaker 1: located about three miles deeper into the forest off the
Speaker 1: main road. The bikers pulled over and made their way
Speaker 1: to a large forest service cabin at the back of
Speaker 1: the site, hoping to find a map of the local area.
Speaker 1: Approaching the building, having just noticed a window that had
Speaker 1: been smashed in, the riders were hit by a sweet,
Speaker 1: putrid stench coming from inside. Going in to investigate further,
Speaker 1: the bikers soon located the source of the smell. There,
Speaker 1: stretched out on a camp bed before them, lying under
Speaker 1: multiple layers of darkly stained sheets, they could clearly see
Speaker 1: the outline of a steadily decomposing body. When the call
Speaker 1: came into the Euber County Sheriff's office later that day
Speaker 1: under sheriff, Beecham grabbed his hat and made his way
Speaker 1: to the nearest patrol car, arriving to find forensics and
Speaker 1: deputies from the Plumers County Sheriff's Office already there. Beecham
Speaker 1: could tell by the look on their faces that they
Speaker 1: had found. One of them covering his nose from the stench.
Speaker 1: Beecham made his way into the cabin and approached the body.
Speaker 1: With the sheets now rolled back, he could see the
Speaker 1: emaciated figure lying underneath the way the cordroy trousers had
Speaker 1: been rolled up to reveal clear signs of gangrene on
Speaker 1: the legs. Next to it, on a side table lay
Speaker 1: a brown wallet, a bead necklace, and a ring. Beecham
Speaker 1: picked it up and examined the engraving on the inside,
Speaker 1: which read simply ted. The body would later be formally
Speaker 1: identified as that of thirty two year old Ted Weir,
Speaker 1: last seen alive almost one hundred days before. The pathologist
Speaker 1: ruled the cause of his death to be the result
Speaker 1: of a pulmonary edema brought on by exposure, having survived
Speaker 1: for up to six weeks after he had first gone missing.
Speaker 1: To get to the cabin, Weir would have to have
Speaker 1: trackt almost twenty miles up hill in minus temperatures through
Speaker 1: six foot snowdrifts in the middle of the night. The
Speaker 1: shirt and cord trousers found on his body, with the
Speaker 1: only clothes he had been wearing. What's more, he had
Speaker 1: most likely been sheltering in the cabin, alive and reasonably
Speaker 1: well throughout the entirety of the original search, but Beecham
Speaker 1: couldn't understand it. A cursory look around the service cabin
Speaker 1: revealed thirty one cans of food that had been taken
Speaker 1: from a storage locker and eaten, but an entire other
Speaker 1: locker's worth that had been left untouched. Propane gas linked
Speaker 1: to a heating system was also discovered, as well as
Speaker 1: stoves and matches, but also books and furniture that could
Speaker 1: easily have been used as fuel for a fire. None
Speaker 1: of it had been utilized. And then there were the
Speaker 1: missing shoes. Weir had been wearing a pair of sturdy
Speaker 1: leather shoes the night he went missing, but when they
Speaker 1: found his body, his shoes had gone. They did, however,
Speaker 1: find another pair of shoes left in the cabin, a
Speaker 1: pair of tennis shoes that had belonged to Gary Matthias.
Speaker 1: A recently burned out candle suggested that perhaps someone else
Speaker 1: had also been there too, long after Weir had died,
Speaker 1: but had since left. The discovery of Weir's body prompted
Speaker 1: an immediate response from the Plumus and Uber County police,
Speaker 1: reconvening the search they had called off three months previously.
Speaker 1: Two days later, tracing likely lines from the service cabin
Speaker 1: back to where the Montago had been abandoned, officers soon
Speaker 1: uncovered another body, or what was left of it. It
Speaker 1: was found roughly halfway between the cabin and the abandoned car,
Speaker 1: lying face up next to a small star dream. The
Speaker 1: face and extremities had been eaten away by forest animals
Speaker 1: some time after death. Car Keys found in the trouser
Speaker 1: pockets revealed it to be the body of thirty year
Speaker 1: old Jack Madruga. Later that day, not far from Madruger's body,
Speaker 1: more human bones were discovered scattered across an area of
Speaker 1: roughly fifty feet. It was all that was left of
Speaker 1: twenty nine year old Bill Stirling. That those three had
Speaker 1: now been discovered was understandably devastating for the relevant families,
Speaker 1: but equally so for those of Gary Matthias. And Jack Hewitt,
Speaker 1: with neither having been heard from in over one hundred days.
Speaker 1: In all likelihood, they hadn't made it out of the
Speaker 1: forest alive either. Believing it to be only a matter
Speaker 1: of time before the others would be found, scores of
Speaker 1: volunteers joined the police to help speed up the ser
Speaker 1: On the morning of June the eighth, Jack Hewitt's father,
Speaker 1: also named Jack, arrived to help. Deputy Lance Heyres, who
Speaker 1: had been entrusted with the case after the initial search
Speaker 1: had been ended, did his best to discourage him from
Speaker 1: joining in, but Jack would not be dissuaded. A few
Speaker 1: hours later, searching an area roughly five miles from the
Speaker 1: cabin where Weir had been found, Jack spotted something out
Speaker 1: of place in the undergrowth. It was a faded Levi's
Speaker 1: denim jacket. He immediately recognized it as his son's. When
Speaker 1: he picked it up from the ground, a human spine
Speaker 1: fell out of it. Jack recoiled in horror as police
Speaker 1: quickly gathered round to take it from him. Hewitt's skull
Speaker 1: was found a further one hundred yards down the hill,
Speaker 1: barely a quarter of a mile away. Investigators also found
Speaker 1: three woolled blankets and flashlights, which had likely been taken
Speaker 1: from the service cabin. But no matter how hard they looked,
Speaker 1: they found no sign of Gary Matthias. After two further
Speaker 1: weeks under Sheriff Jack Beecham called off the search for
Speaker 1: a second time. The bodies, or rather remains of the
Speaker 1: four men that had so far been found had been
Speaker 1: placed into green canvas bags after all, just as supposed
Speaker 1: psychic doctor Daniel had apparently seen, only they weren't sleeping
Speaker 1: bags but body bags. Bill Stirling, Jack Madruger, and Jack
Speaker 1: Hewitt's deaths were all found to have been the result
Speaker 1: of hypothermia, with no apparent signs of foul play. That
Speaker 1: their bones and bodies were in the state that they
Speaker 1: were was thought merely to have been down to the
Speaker 1: animals that got to them after they died. All that
Speaker 1: was left for Beecham was to try and piece together
Speaker 1: exactly what happened, and he knew just where to start.
Speaker 1: Beacham had his doubts about the twenty five year old
Speaker 1: Gary Matthias from the beginning. Where the others had intellectual
Speaker 1: disabilities of one form or another, Matthias had no such thing.
Speaker 1: Early on in the investigation, Beacham learned from Matthias's family
Speaker 1: that his involvement with the Gateway project and how he
Speaker 1: met the others in the first place, was due to
Speaker 1: his struggles with schizophrenia. What Beacham also discovered, however, was
Speaker 1: that his history was a little more complicated than that.
Speaker 1: Matthias had in fact been in and out of psychiatric
Speaker 1: hospitals since the age of fifteen, first being committed after
Speaker 1: seemingly having suffered an adverse reaction from taking hallucinogenic drugs.
Speaker 1: After being drafted into the army at the age of eighteen,
Speaker 1: despite his clear medical records, Matthias is said to have
Speaker 1: suffered another psychiatric breakdown as the result of his continued
Speaker 1: drug use. At one point, Matthias was arrested after going
Speaker 1: a wall while waiting in his cell. He demanded to
Speaker 1: speak to the officers on duty, only to attack them
Speaker 1: when they opened his door. Matthias had stripped completely naked
Speaker 1: before carrying out the attack. Around the same time, the
Speaker 1: nineteen year old Matthias, now living back home in Olivehurst,
Speaker 1: went to visit his cousin. At some point in the night,
Speaker 1: Matthias was discovered sexually assaulting his cousin's wife, while she slept.
Speaker 1: After being charged with assaulting a police officer and intent
Speaker 1: to rape, Matthias was facing up to twelve years in prison,
Speaker 1: but eventually accepted a plea deal and served only eight months.
Speaker 1: After his release, Matthias's behaviour became ever more erratic. With
Speaker 1: his drug use escalating, he found himself increasingly on the
Speaker 1: wrong side of the law. There were a number of
Speaker 1: bar fights, as well as complaints of disturbing the peace.
Speaker 1: One time, Matthias is even said to have turned up
Speaker 1: high at the house of a couple he knew, telling
Speaker 1: them he was going to stab a woman in the jaw.
Speaker 1: Two subsequent attempts to have him committed ended in failure
Speaker 1: when Matthias managed to escape on one account by crawling
Speaker 1: out of a storm drain. In nineteen seventy five, Gary
Speaker 1: Matthias enrolled at Eyuber College, but struggled with both its
Speaker 1: conventions and fitting in with other students. Eventually he moved
Speaker 1: out to Oregon in Washington State to live with his grandmother,
Speaker 1: only to turn up at his mother and stepfather's house
Speaker 1: weeks later, tired into chevel. He had apparently worked the
Speaker 1: five hundred and forty mile journey home eating food he
Speaker 1: found along the way to stay alive, all of which,
Speaker 1: for Beecham, made Matthias not only a potential candidate for
Speaker 1: the murder of the other men, or at least to
Speaker 1: have led them astray, but also one who might even
Speaker 1: have been capable of getting out at the forest alive.
Speaker 1: That Gary Matthias has never been found only serves to
Speaker 1: heighten this theory. It has also been speculated that at
Speaker 1: least Matthias and possibly Jack Hewitt had made it to
Speaker 1: the service cabin with Ted Weir, only to leave soon after,
Speaker 1: with Matthias being the one most likely to have taken
Speaker 1: Weir's shoes. Unless Gary Matthias is found to have survived
Speaker 1: after all, it is unlikely there will ever be an
Speaker 1: arts as to what exactly happened on that mysterious night
Speaker 1: in February nineteen seventy eight, while five men found themselves
Speaker 1: driving high up into the Sierra Nevada Mountains seventy miles
Speaker 1: in the wrong direction. Why Having gone as far as
Speaker 1: they could, the men then seemingly abandoned their car and
Speaker 1: undertook a treacherous journey through thick forest and six foot snowdrifts,
Speaker 1: reaching ever higher into the mountains, only to find death
Speaker 1: waiting for them at the end of it. Much has
Speaker 1: been made about the men's intellectual capacities, suggesting this may
Speaker 1: have been a significant factor in what could have been
Speaker 1: little more than a horrifically wrong turn. Some have suggested
Speaker 1: this might also account for why those who made it
Speaker 1: to the forest to serve his cabin didn't eat the
Speaker 1: food and engage the heating apparatus to survive. Others suggest that,
Speaker 1: due to their innocence with such things, are worried that
Speaker 1: they will break the law made them too afraid to
Speaker 1: do so. As for Gary Matthias, despite under Sheriff Beecham's
Speaker 1: reservations in the time leading up to his disappearance, he
Speaker 1: appeared to have turned his life around. Not only was
Speaker 1: he holding down a steady job, but having finally been
Speaker 1: treated properly for his schizophrenia, of which most of his
Speaker 1: erratic behavior was likely just a symptom, he hadn't suffered
Speaker 1: any negative effects from it for over two years. Once
Speaker 1: lost in the forest, however, we can only speculate how
Speaker 1: quickly he may have deteriorated without his medication. Certainly, for
Speaker 1: Gary's mother and stepfather, theirs was an especially difficult anguish.
Speaker 1: Not only did they never get closure, but in the
Speaker 1: absence of it, they were also forced to endure the
Speaker 1: inevitable suspicions that arose once Gary's passed came to the
Speaker 1: attention of the public. Like many of the other parents,
Speaker 1: Gary's mother and stepfather had also joined in with the
Speaker 1: search for the missing men. His stepfather, Robert, had spent
Speaker 1: most of his time hunting for Gary's distinctive thick, black
Speaker 1: rimmed glasses, reasoning that if a bear had taken him,
Speaker 1: it would have at least left those uneaten. In all
Speaker 1: the time spent waiting for news of her son's whereabouts,
Speaker 1: Gary's mother, Ida, refused to turn on her television to
Speaker 1: afraid of what she might find out. But no news
Speaker 1: ever came. She would spend the rest of her life
Speaker 1: looking for him. I'd like to thank Ryan Vaughns in
Speaker 1: New York for bringing this extraordinary story to my attention.
Speaker 1: This episode was written by Richard McLain Smith unexplained as
Speaker 1: an Avy Club Productions podcast created by Richard McLain Smith.
Speaker 1: All other elements of the podcast, including the music, are
Speaker 1: also produced by me. Richard McClean smith unexplained the book
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